Thermal ink-jet printers offer a low cost, high quality, and comparatively noise-free option to other types of printers commonly used with computers. Such printers employ a resistor element in a chamber provided with an egress for ink to enter from a plenum. The plenum is connected to a reservoir for storing the ink. A plurality of such resistor elements are arranged in a particular pattern, called a primitive, in a printhead. Each resistor element is associated with a nozzle in a nozzle plate, through which ink is expelled toward a print medium. The entire assembly of printhead and reservoir comprise an ink-jet pen.
In operation, each resistor element is connected via a conductive trace to a microprocessor, where current carrying signals cause one or more selected elements to heat up. The heating creates a bubble of ink in the chamber, which is expelled through the nozzle toward the print medium. In this way, firing of a plurality of such resistor elements in a particular order in a given primitive forms alphanumeric characters, performs area fill, and provides other print capabilities on the medium.
Many thermal ink-jet inks, when printed in various colors on bond paper, copier paper, and other media, can lead to bleed. The term "bleed", as used herein, is defined as follows: When inks of two different colors are printed next to each other, it is desired that the border between the two colors be clean and free from the invasion of one color into the other. When one color does invade into the other, the border between the two colors becomes ragged, and this is bleed.
This is in contradistinction to uses of the term in the prior art, which often defines "bleed" in the context of ink of a single color following the fibers of the paper.
Prior solutions to bleed have largely involved the use of heated platens or other heat sources or the use of a separate fixer solution to pre-coat the paper and/or special paper. Heated platens add cost and complexity to the printer. Fixing solutions also add cost and additional liquid to be dispensed. Special paper limits the user to a small, select group of papers that are more expensive than a "plain" paper.
A need remains for ink compositions for use in ink-jet printing, particularly thermal ink-jet printing, which do not evidence bleed, as defined herein, when printed on plain papers and without the use of heaters or a separate fixer solution to pre-coat the paper, and yet which possess relatively long shelf life and other desirable properties of such inks.